


Pale as Arena Sand

by CurlicueCal, LaughingStones



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe - No Sburb/Sgrub Sessions, First Time, Gladiator AU, M/M, Pale Romance | Moirallegiance, Pale in public, Xenobiology, trolls conquered by humans, xeno pale voice stuff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-10
Updated: 2018-06-10
Packaged: 2019-05-20 18:36:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,683
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14899826
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CurlicueCal/pseuds/CurlicueCal, https://archiveofourown.org/users/LaughingStones/pseuds/LaughingStones
Summary: Karkat meets Gamzee for the first time on the arena sands, where they're supposed to fight to the death for the amusement of their alien conquerors.  That's not... exactly how it goes.





	Pale as Arena Sand

**Author's Note:**

> loosely inspired by [this post](https://rollerskatinglizard.tumblr.com/post/144226179396) and the xeno meta in [this thread](http://curlicuecal.tumblr.com/post/145571162035/shoosh-pap-vs-asmr) :3

Karkat stepped into the arena, squinting a little in the weak alien sun. The crowd was a swelling, anticipatory roar that almost drowned out the drumming of his bloodpusher, the rush of blood in his ears.

The sand was hot under his bare walk-nubs and the handles of his sickles didn't seem to fit right in his fronds. He kept shifting his grip and they kept feeling wrong despite the hours he'd spent practicing with them (against no one, fighting shadows, doing empty forms with no notion of what it'd be like to face a real enemy in combat oh god oh fuck).

A voice projected above the rest of the noise, ringing around the arena in a monotone drawl.

Different than the voice he’d been hearing--one of the royal princes appeared to have captured the auditory broadcast unit from the official commentator. He wasn’t even troubling himself to talk about, you know. The actual fucking death matches the humans were taking such effort to make a public spectacle out of. He seemed to be muttering slam poetry instead. Whatever. Karkat stopped listening.

It was hard to ignore that he was half naked in front of hundreds of people, shirtless and unarmored and probably about to have his mutant blood spilled across the sand. Not that they would care about the color, weird hornless aliens, red-blooded to a one and wasn't that just a hysterical irony, the soft fierce deadly species that knocked the empire on its ass had blood the same color as his. Yeah, he sure laughed himself sick when he found out, cold and wobbly with shock, newly captured. 

Giant screens hung above the arena. Huge images played there of Karkat coming onto the sands, figure dwarfed by the empty expanse, all streamed live from the cameras floating around the arena. He tried to keep his eyes away because seeing whatever was on his face, confirming how small and desperate he looked--was not a good plan. 

The screens switched to quick glimpses of the crowd, eager faces in weird browns and tans, and seeing their hungry expressions was worse, but then the view went to the royal box. All four of the royals were there, the reigning prince and his inclade (hatchmates? Who the fuck knew), with hair the color of the arena sand and nearly expressionless faces except for the pink one, who was giggling into her liquid intoxicant.

According to what Karkat had been told, the royals might grant him their royal favor, give him some nebulous reward if he fought well and pleased them. The story was obviously meant to ensure he didn't give up outright; how stupid did they think he was, honestly, a _reward?_ (Unless it was a quick death. He might believe that.)

They didn’t look like any of this pleased them. They looked… bored. The-- what the fuck did you even call it, why did aliens have so many unnecessary royals-- the lesser prince had lost the auditory broadcast unit again, and was slouched back in his throne, head tipped back to point his ocular brightness-shields at the sky as if he’d rather be anywhere else. Good to know Karkat’s impending protracted evisceration was of no particular notice or excitement; what the fuck, wasn’t this considered good entertainment? 

The humans had their turnabout, their victory inversion of the Condesce’s famous games with her captured enemies, and just, seriously, this was _your fucking idea, people_ , don’t act like you’re not getting what you wanted. Not as if Karkat had delusions of his life being relevant as more than a tiny blip on the vast pustule-riddled face of this interspecies post-war fallout, but he liked to think he could at least die with enough majestic _fuck you_ to take note of. 

What even was the point of this whole bring-thine-enemies-low massacrefest if you weren’t at least going to get your twisted pitch rocks off?

If he let himself think about this shit he'd be done, so he let the crowd’s yelling wash over him, didn't flinch at the pale alien sunlight beating on his face and shoulders, reflecting up from the sand. Fixed his eyes instead on the gate on the other side of the arena. He watched it until the crowd began to quiet, anticipation building. The arena master was milking the pause for all it was worth.

Karkat swallowed, tried to breathe into aeration sacs that felt locked closed.

 _Okay, maybe you’re going to be dead shortly, but you're not dead_ yet, he told himself. _Keep breathing, stay on your feet, keep moving and you could survive a little longer. Fuck them all, anyway, maybe you'll be up against some spindly clerkivist or something and_ decimate _their ass, you don't know! You're a vicious, deadly, magnificent fighter and you’re going to slaughter whoever comes out that gate!_

The gate opened.

The figure that stumbled out was... vast. A lanky towering form with tall twisting horns and charcoal grey skin, sweeps darker than Karkat’s wiggler-soft, barely post pupation silver. Not a clerkivist. Bigger, and older, with the whipcord lines of strength showing in every stretch of embarrassingly-exposed skin, bare thorax marked with the paler scars of an experienced fighter. It struck Karkat with a distant, dizzying kind of hysteria that the scars were faintly purple in some places. 

_...Nope, I'm definitely going to die._

And in either hand the highblood held massive, bleached lengths of bone, the juggling clubs stained faintly rainbow. A full-grown purpleblood subjugglator up against Karkat, untrained and barely molted into adulthood.

_I’m going to die and it’s going to hurt a LOT._

Karkat blinked up at the other troll and braced his feet, showing his fangs half-heartedly, trying to manage something more like a proper threat display than _oh-god-please-don’t-hurt-me._

The subjugglator wasn’t even looking at him.

Glancing around the arena, the troll tossed his horns and the tangled mess of his hair (there, see, Karkat, _that_ is what a threat display is supposed to look like), snarling at the surrounding spectators in a resonant throbbing tearing sound that made Karkat’s claws prickle defensively and brought yells and hoots from the crowd. A camera-drone whizzed a little too close to those long horns, flashing a close up of fangs onto the looming overhead screens, and the subjugglator’s arm lashed out faster than Karkat could track, club actually clipping the drone and sending it reeling off-kilter towards the stands.

The crowd roared excitement and approval; the remaining hovering cameras pulled back to circle at a more respectful distance. The subjugglator watched them, watched the out-of-reach crowd, his breath coming uneven on a lingering snarl and his shoulders heaving with stymied wrath. The eyes under that tangle of hair were a feral glow of purple and dark red-orange. 

The eyes moved to focus on Karkat. The subjugglator tilted his head slightly, gaze so far gone into that burning, drugging pit of highblood rage it hardly seemed to see him at all.

Karkat… attempted to look threatening. Karkat suspected he did not succeed.

Those hazy, heavy-lidded eyes blinked once, slowly--something down in the depths of them, some hint of a thought under all that deadly instinct, a flash Karkat would never have seen if he wasn’t frozen, fixated under that gaze with his pusher hammering so hard in his thorax he could hardly think, everything crystal bright, fear and adrenaline bitter on the back of his tongue.

The subjugglator charged.

It was obvious that trying to meet the rush was suicidal, and so was any attempt to turn or counter his blows. Karkat dove out of the way and rolled, coming up still uselessly clutching his sickles. 

As he'd expected, the subjugglator was really fucking fast. His next charge came before Karkat even got his footing. Somehow Karkat scrambled away again. 

The crowd was screaming on all sides, shouting encouragement for the subjugglator or for Karkat, (little guy, shorty, stub-horns oh _fuck you_ ), or just yelling indiscriminately for bloodshed and dismemberment. They sounded almost like trolls in their bloodthirst. 

Yay, common ground.

Karkat’s mind was empty of thought, blank desperation and awareness of his own fragility filling all available room. He scrabbled frantically to survive another handful of seconds, diving and rolling and dashing, clubs sweeping past a hair's breadth away, slamming into the ground just behind him. He was terrified, he was going to die, and he was somehow, under it all, blazingly, breathlessly furious. This was pointless. This was unnecessary. This was so fucking _stupid._

Another deadly sweep of a club--graceless, almost an afterthought, a mindless, automatic destruction that still almost separated Karkat’s pan messily from his shoulders with the raw fury and strength behind it. Karkat rolled again, arena sand scraping the bared chitin of his side, numbed fronds nearly losing grip of his right sickle. He caught sight of those mad red eyes, lost to all reason or thought, and somehow in the middle of it all his mouth came open.

“ _Shoosh,_ ” he heard himself say, voice shaking and breathless. (And angry, still so angry.) Jumped over one club, dodged the other, and were they moving a tiny bit more slowly? “Hey, shoosh! I'm talking to you, you giant lump! Calm down!” 

Fuck oh fuck, one club barely caught him, glanced past his shoulder and nothing broke as far as he could tell but now that arm didn't want to move right. Fuck, what was he even doing, this was such a dumb idea but apparently he was going for it anyway. He was going to die looking so _stupid._

“Shoosh, come on, _shoooosh._ ” 

It took a minute to register the odd new hum in his last word, and then Karkat almost faceplanted in the sand and died right there, because what the _fuck_ , he sounded like some pale porn acterrorist, voice pitching low in some stupid attempt at pacifying subvocals and undertones. Like he thought he could trigger a submission reflex, like he thought some random stranger would be that overcome by Karkat’s voice that he’d let all his self-preservation instincts fuck right off and be _soothed_.

(At the back of Karkat’s head, he knew exactly what video he was imitating, too, and it was the one with the pretty greenblood whose vocal skills were so good she didn’t even _need_ to set palm to face, just spoke sweet and certain with the kind of harmonics that could not be denied, and that-- well, that realization was more than a little mortifying, in the distant way where apparently Karkat could still take time to be blisteringly embarrassed even while mostly about to die.)

If his own subvocalizations had any effect there was absolutely no evidence of it in the way the subjugglator _kept trying to kill him_. Karkat ducked away from a swipe, didn't have time to get under the next one and hopelessly went to block it with both sickles, except that hand was barely gripping-- The blow threw him back onto the sand, slamming the breath out of him and wrenching his sickles away entirely.

The crowd _howled._

For a moment Karkat couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe, and this was it, he was going to die now. Couldn’t even talk, couldn’t try to shoosh again, not that that had been working anyway, not that that would ever have worked, and maybe he should try to look pitiful or secretly dangerous or _something,_ but he just hunched on the sand in this ridiculous alien deathmatch arena and looked up and snarled, breathless and fuming.

God fucking _damn_ but this whole thing was stupid.

His death loomed over him in silence, teeth bared and eyes still deadly red at the edges, long arms swinging. One club arced down and Karkat tried to fling himself aside but he had no leverage, floundering in the sand and still half-starved of air, oh god dying was going to hurt _so bad_ \--

The club collided with the ground with a solid _thunk_ so close Karkat felt the spray of displaced sand sting the bare skin of his back. 

He _missed._

How the fuck had the subjugglator _missed?_ Then both clubs landed in the sand and those freakishly long, powerful arms reached down, grabbed Karkat around the upper thorax, and lifted him into the air, up to the subjugglator’s face. The subjugglator pulled him in close, hissed in his _face_ and… tossed those long, twisting horns….

...Holy shit, one of them was insane and Karkat wasn't sure which. Unless he was hallucinating, in context that read as an outrageously blatant pale solicitation--‘look how lethally out of control I am, better calm me down if you're good enough’. Holy fucking shit, the shooshing was _working_.

Unfortunately, his airsacs were still seized up from slamming into the ground like that, and a proper shoosh required more air than he had. Instead Karkat raised a shaking hand to the subjugglator’s face, stroked from broad cheekbone down to jaw. 

The moment stretched as everything held still. The noise from the crowd dropped off. (They’re watching, everyone can see-- _don’t think about it-_ -) Karkat tried to remember how to breathe. The subjugglator stared at him unmoving, eyes purple on flame-orange, mouth agape.

(So angry, how long had the subjugglator been trapped in his own rage like this, held here to entertain the alien conquerors like a toy instead of the cunning force of destruction he should be? They kept him infuriated and used him in their games and it was so fucking _wrong_ \--) 

Caught in those rage-red eyes, vulnerable skin soft under his palm, Karkat’s pusher flipped helplessly.

Then the world unfroze and Karkat was abruptly flung into the air, the subjugglator roaring outrage at his temerity (so forward, so brazen), the crowd screaming at an even higher pitch of excitement over the continuing unexpected turns of events. Karkat managed to twist and come down rolling, confused and pissed and more than a little freaked out. He shoved back up to his feet sucking in full breaths of air and startled not to have been smashed flat by clubs already, doubly startled the subjugglator wasn't looming over him yet.

Instead he was pacing, retrieved clubs in his hands, circling towards Karkat in a showy, deadly manner like he was _stalking_ him. Which made absolutely no sense, he'd already proven he could turn Karkat into grubsauce with one quick rush and be finished. Unless... tossing him away like that wasn't actually meant as a pale rejection?

Heart pounding with something other than fear for the first time, Karkat let his weight sink lower, like he thought he had a chance, like maybe he was secretly a remotely competent fighter after all. Circling opposite the subjugglator, he tried to keep some distance between them, thoughts spinning wildly, pusher still beating fast in his thorax. He had no idea what he was doing, no clue if he was reading the subjugglator correctly (and if he was, oh), but he was damned if he wasn’t going to try _something_.

Conquered, kidnapped, forced to fight for the amusement of several hundred alien douchebags--Karkat could imagine weirder circumstances for a pale seduction, but not many. (Life or death drama like something out of a historical romgrub and he couldn't decide if it was incredibly romantic or just terrifying.) Strange alien eyes picked him apart from every side, cameras circled, his face was being broadcast on screens taller than his hiveblock, and… this powerful, angry troll was watching him like he was _important._

He thought of Nepeta and did his level best to prowl like she would, opened his mouth and said, “Shhhh, _shoosh_ now.”

The subjugglator hissed at him but kept stalking sideways, around the circle the two of them were making. 

“Shhhh,” Karkat told him again. The underlying hum to his voice was cutting in and out, but growing clearer now, steadier, running through every soothing word he said. It got stronger the more Karkat dropped into the moment, submerged himself in the need to calm, a resonant thrum in his thorax he didn't seem to have much control over. A coaxing promise, a soft demand— _you can trust this you can stop now let it feel good_ —and he’d always felt stupid when he tried it alone, but it came naturally now, as unconscious as a purr or the murderous grate and whine under the subjugglator’s growling.

The subjugglator’s lashes flickered and he shivered, a fine, full-body tremor of reaction that Karkat wouldn’t have seen if it hadn’t been broadcast at high resolution across half a dozen screens. _(--Don’t think about it!_ )

Karkat took a step towards him and he circled edgily away, growl flaring up into a full warning snarl.

 _He doesn't want to get close enough for me to pap him again,_ Karkat thought. _I'm right, I_ know _I'm right, he wants me to pacify him, but that doesn't mean he's going to make it easy. He_ can't _, as worked up as he is, as long as he's been fighting, first in the war and then being stuck here for, what, three perigees? No fucking wonder he's practically feral._

Karkat’s sickles were about five steps away behind him, but noticing was only a reflex; he made no move to reach them. “Shhhh,” he said again, and felt the word tremble out of him like a weight in the air, watched the way it struck and pulled at the other troll.

They circled a moment longer before the subjugglator abruptly stopped and shook himself as though to throw something off. He lowered his horns, eyes flashing at Karkat, and charged. This time as Karkat spun out of his way he could _tell_ the clubs were aimed just past him, barely behind as he moved. (He was right, he was _right_ , he might somehow survive this if he didn't fuck it up horribly. They might _both --don’t think about it._ )

“Shoosh,” he panted, diving away from the next strike and rolling to his feet again. “Shhh, hush, calm down.”

Another few long-limbed fast-moving charges that only just missed him every time, and Karkat was completely out of breath again, gasping his shooshes, thrumming out wordless demands on instinct. He wasn't sure how long he could keep dodging, and was equally unclear if the subjugglator would keep aiming past him even when Karkat was stumbling and slow or if habit and rage would get the better of him. Best to assume time was running out.

The crowd was howling enthusiasm again, and Karkat had no idea how the aliens would respond if this ended without bloodshed, (--oh god seriously don’t think about it--!), but he’d deal with that when he got there. 

Diving away from one club, he barely dodged the other one, then lunged to grab the thick-muscled wrist just below it. Fuck, his grip was still shit, but the subjugglator immediately yanked to free himself and Karkat clung on long enough to get jerked into him, inside his reach where it would be harder to use the clubs. Then before the subjugglator could pull away, Karkat jumped, hooked his good arm over those broad bare shoulders, and hung there, feet dangling well above the sand as he frantically papped the subjugglator’s face with his weak hand.

“Shhh. _Shhh,_ shoosh. Calm the fuck down, stop hissing at me. _Shoooosh._ ”

It wasn’t-- it wasn’t like Karkat had thought his first time would be--too (messy, too much gut churning fear and desperation)-- wasn’t like in the movies (okay, it was a _little_ like the movies), but-- but it was--

Tense, snarling muscles under his hand, teeth within striking distance of his wrist, and eyes still so utterly fixed on him, fixed like he was the whole world, fixed like he was the only point of surety in the chaos of a storm.

The subjugglator blinked and blinked again, muscles of his thorax twitching uneasily under Karkat’s arm, under Karkat’s knees where he was braced against that thorax, and a hint of the red faded from his scleras, the snarl he'd been wearing the entire time fading with it. Without it, he looked a lot different, almost... dopey. (Vulnerable, innocent.) For sure he didn't look much like a lethal vehicle of mass slaughter. 

Oh…

Karkat’s upper thorax throbbed painfully, rage and tenderness (and, say it, pity) mixing together into something fierce and protective.

His voice dropped lower, quieter, like he could hide from the intrusive cameras whirring around them, angling in to capture their faces. The harmonics came so naturally now. “Shhhh, shoosh now, I’ve got you. Let me… let me have you,” he finished, dry-mouthed.

He patted the bridge of the subjugglator’s nose and stroked beside his nose and mouth as his eyelids fluttered and closed, opened again slow and dazed. Ignoring the way his own club-bruised shoulder throbbed at holding up that arm, Karkat kept papping, kept quietly hushing him. Kept feeling weirdly protective of someone who could kill Karkat with one hand. 

The subjugglator blinked again slowly and gave him a faint, puzzled frown, opened his mouth like he wanted to say something and then lost the words.

To Karkat's vague surprise, the noise from the crowd had only dropped a little, even though the aliens apparently had no grasp whatsoever of the true drama taking place here. They weren't screaming for blood now, but there was still a fair amount of shouted encouragement and excited cheering mixed in with the quieter discussion and confused questions. (Maybe there _was_ a tiny chance he and the subjugglator wouldn't both be torn apart by a barbaric alien mob cheated of violence.) ( _Please_ let there be--)

Hanging against the subjugglator like this, Karkat could feel the tension in the long, powerful body slowly ebbing. He'd expected the relief that grew in him as the subjugglator’s arms relaxed, clubs hanging limp, and the surge of hot pity made sense, but the thrill that came with it took him by surprise. The exhilaration that swept through him as he saw the red fading from the edges of those wild eyes, orange gradually lightening to yellow, was a lot more than amazement at being alive or astonishment at an ability he hadn't known he had. It was an unexpected feeling of ...power. Fierce, dizzying pridecarried on a surge of protective warmth.

“What in the motherfuck,” the subjugglator muttered, blinking at him perplexed.

“I'm shooshing your ass,” Karkat told him sternly. “Uh, I mean. Um. If that’s okay?”

The subjugglator _shuddered_ and leaned into his hand. “Motherfucking _please_ , bro.”

Karkat’s face just about lit on fire. 

This was real, he was really doing this and it was _working_. Karkat was successfully calming a fully grown subjugglator out of a killing rage with nothing more than words and his bare hands. Despite being in the least conducive circumstances possible, surrounded by enemies cheering for blood, he was somehow doing this. 

He shifted his fingers just slightly, against cool skin, claws so careful. Tried to move his hand for a proper pap, but his muscles trembled and protested, his tired arm holding him up ready to slip. 

“Okay,” Karkat said instead, voice unsteady, but it didn’t seem to matter, the way the other troll’s eyes fixed on him, pupils dilating. “Okay, okay. Shh. Shoosh. Easy now.” His subvocals were doing the porn thing again, a bossy, conciliating thrum, and the subjugglator just shivered and went even more lax.

Holy shit.

His arm trembled again. “Do _not_ lose your shit,” he said sternly, “just wait a second, I can't--” He tried to pull himself back up using both arms, but his muscles were tired and unresponsive. A second later he was stumbling in the sand, hoping the calm didn't wear off. Then there was a _thunk_ on either side of him as the clubs hit the ground and the towering figure before him swayed and crumpled to the sand.

The crowd went completely berserk.

“Holy shit,” Karkat said blankly, and could barely hear himself. Confusion mingled with alarm as he stared at the subjugglator lying still on the ground. “What the nook-sucking _fuck_.” He hadn't soothed him anywhere _near_ thoroughly enough to make him go limp like that. Had he? Or. Fuck--had something gone wrong--had Karkat _hurt_ him somehow?

Crouching down, Karkat leaned over close to his face, nerves thrumming at the proximity. “Uh, hey--”

The subjugglator cut him off without opening his eyes, lips barely moving. “Shoosh, motherfucker, don't you pause here. Stand up, get your hands up like you motherfucking _won_. Satisfy the softskinned heretics and we'll live.”

Oh. Oh, he was faking it and--shit, this was the part where--where something had to--where _what_ was going to happen exactly?

Jerking to his feet, Karkat thrust his fists in the air, pusher thumping, scowling his bewildered triumph as directed at the surrounding mass of hollering aliens, who yelled still louder to see him standing victorious. Some of the yelling sounded angry, which fit his expectations, but some of it was clearly pleased, which didn't. Why would they be happy to see _any_ troll win, especially a half-grown mutant? Especially when he hadn't even given them the bloody spectacle they'd been expecting?

(The subjugglator was at his feet, giving Karkat the victory; they were cheering his defeat, cheering him made vulnerable and helpless, and what was going to happen if he _wasn’t, fuck_ , what was going to happen _if he was--_ )

Karkat couldn’t seem to help the way a snarl was bubbling up in his throat, barely audible panicky threat (-- _mine, he gave himself to me, don’t touch him, I won’t let you--)_

\--Which was ridiculous, what was he going to do, and the subjugglator was _faking_ anyways, it wasn’t as if he’d let himself get _killed_ for Karkat--

Ignorant of his private confusion, the faces of the crowd turned to the royal box, tenor going expectant, and a minute later the big screens cut to a closeup on the royal clade. Karkat found his own eyes fixing on them as well, not on the screen, but on the box itself, as if there was no distance at all between them.

They looked… substantially less bored, anyway. They looked as if he had done something interesting; the reigning prince’s attention fixed sharp and unreadable on Karkat, his closest hatchmate leaning in to murmur into his ear, an eyebrow raised archly. Even the one that had been giggling into her drink was sitting up, nudging the lesser prince and talking in rapid undertones with him.

Karkat suddenly, very much did not want to be interesting. 

The royal clade dropped into what looked like an intense conference. It was hard to believe they weren't just discussing how long to draw out Karkat and the subjugglator’s death. Karkat swallowed and stubbornly kept his arms raised in victory, even as his bruised shoulder burned and the muscles shook. A man Karkat recognized as the master of the arena hurried into the royal box and was questioned. He made a bunch of emphatic gestures, bowed and exited again. 

There was another moment of discussion between the royals before their attention turned as one back to Karkat, four pairs of eyes suddenly sharp upon him, even from the distance. (Two pairs of eyes and two brightness shields. It didn’t help.)

The reigning prince extended a fist, drawing the crowd to hushed, expectant silence. Karkat discovered he could be gut-wrenchingly terrified and utterly baffled all at the same time.

The fist rotated in the air and delivered a thumbs up.

The crowd erupted into noise, mostly cheerful excitement, and the announcer started saying something over the loudspeakers about Karkat’s victory, something about a prize, a royal audience. And just. What even the fuck, Karkat didn’t have any emotions left, he didn’t know what was happening, he didn’t understand aliens, he couldn’t fucking _deal with this anymore--_

Beside the prince, his clademate, the one all in subjugglator purple, tilted painted lips up in a smirk and extended her own dainty fist in a _second_ thumbs up.

The crowd went utterly fucking nuts.

If he’d thought they were loud before, this was noise that hammered on his auriculars, commotion that vibrated through the sand under his bare walk-nubs. He couldn’t hear the announcer. He didn’t know if he was about to live or die. He was so tired, and so terrified, and so fucking done with all of this, Karkat just dropped his arms and glared blearily in the direction of the royal box, like maybe the sheer helpless force of his fury could pick these dumb aliens up and shake some sense out of them.

“ _Bow,_ motherfucker,” hissed the subjugglator from the sand at his feet, and Karkat jerked and almost fell over.

“ _Why the fuck_ \--” he started, hissed and low, but the subjugglator cut him short.

“They’ve spared us. One and both. For their caprice and soft heathen mercies, we get a chance, little brother, and a meeting to see how we please them. Swallow pride and bide, little diamond, for I would not see your blood on this sand. _Bow_.”

Bewildered, flushing, ( _little diamond?!_ ) Karkat jerked himself from his paralysis and folded into a clumsy bow toward the royal box. 

A personal meeting with--did they want to kill him themselves? Torture him, interrogate him? That last, at least, was unlikely, since he wasn't a trained fighter; there was no way he knew anything that could be useful to them. Unless they wanted to know exactly why the last season of _Hatefriends_ had been so disappointing, of course. He could tell them that in detail, with footnotes.

Really, though, they weren't likely to be asking him anything. Which left only the less pleasant alternatives.

“Good,” said the subjugglator. “Now make like to wake me, like I'm sunk deep, and help me up.”

Right, right, put off thinking about Karkat's second imminent doom of the day and deal with the first one. Which had turned out to be an enigma instead. 

Karkat crouched and cautiously brushed back the tangle of hair that had fallen over the subjugglator’s face, patted his cheek gently, then a little more sharply. 

He felt his own face flaming furiously. Somehow, without the imminent threat of limb-rending violence, this all felt so very much more… personal. Like a choice, like a shared intimacy, like a pale gesture of affection very-the-fuck-much in public, oh god, and part of Karkat was going to have an absolute fucking _meltdown_ about that later. 

Another part of him was being a fucking moron, flailing over how tangled all that hair was under his hand, how scarred up and deadly and angry and tense the guy looked. How he shivered, just a little, under Karkat’s touch. _Pull it the fuck together, idiot, this isn't a rom-com._

 _...Fuck do I wish it was._

“Why are we doing this?” he mumbled. The last of that odd thrumming sound was gone from his voice, now, and the exhilaration of having successfully shooshpapped a subjugglator had faded to a husk of itself.

“Less they know of our kind, the safer for us.” The subjugglator’s lashes fluttered and lifted slowly. He blinked at Karkat like he was only half awake, and then. Smiled. Like. Like he, okay, that wasn't half-asleep, that was _just been piled to within an inch of his life_ , oh god what the fuck this was _unfair_.

“What’s your name, little brother? Hands like those and a brother’d like to get his know on.”

“Karkat Vantas,” Karkat muttered.

“Gamzee Makara,” the subjugglator breathed, still with that soft, pleased, freshly-soothed look on his face.

Grabbing one thick upper arm, Karkat heaved, letting the effort excuse his gritted teeth. “So how exactly does elaborate public roleplay help keep us safe,” he growled. 

The subjugglator--Gamzee? Makara? _agh_ \--staggered waveringly to his feet over several gradual stages, leaning on Karkat the entire time. “Simple,” he murmured through a dopey half-grin, nuzzling in close to speak soft in Karkat’s ear. “Gets the thought on them as we might be easier prey than they had clue to. Now they dream they've up and found the secret.”

Makara straightened the rest of the way to his full, towering height and Karkat fought the pan-rendingly mortifying desire to pull him back close. He masked the desire under a hunch and a scowl. “The fuck does it matter? We've already lost the war.”

“Might matter to those of us yet living caged here.” A very quiet snarl picked up under the words and was swallowed down again. The subjugglator’s cheerful expression never shifted.

Karkat’s palm itched to pap him. He ignored it by focusing on his aching shoulder instead, and Makara’s uncomfortable, unfamiliar weight still partly resting on him. His hands shouldn't be empty for papping anyway, he was missing his sickles. Couldn’t forget those.

“Pick up your clubs,” he said, “I've got to--”

“No I motherfucking will not,” Makara said, “and no more will you. We leave our weapons, or they get the thought coming on them as we might attack their highest ruling folk.” He snorted. “Barely a need for such, they're so motherfucking easy to kill. Once a brother gets past their crafty distance weapons, anyhow, and little chance of those getting on their use this day.”

“What the hell,” Karkat hissed as subtly as possible, “you'd better not be telling me you’re planning to try and kill the alien royalty, because we would die so fucking fast--!”

The subjugglator sighed mournfully. “True enough, mayhap. Motherfucking shame, though.”

“I will shoosh you into grubpaste, so help me,” Karkat said, and flushed hot when Makara snickered.

“Some motherfucking threat, little brother, peace and quiet all down to the mirthful bones of me.”

Okay, _wow_. Forcibly turning his thoughts elsewhere, Karkat looked at his sickles, discarded on the sand. Sure, they'd done just about nothing to preserve his worthless life, but he'd sure felt more confident holding them than he did without them.

“Will we--if they want us to fight again, they'll have to give them back, right?”

“If it's so, they surely will,” Makara said, less than reassuringly, and took a clumsy step towards the gate, dragging Karkat stumbling with him by the heavy arm across his shoulders.

“This is ridiculous, tone it down for fuck’s sake,” Karkat growled after a few weaving steps. “You're moving like a pan-addled, intoxicated wiggler too dumb to realize it’s got its walknub-covers on backwards. That’s not acting, that’s just a disgrace to the species.”

Makara blinked down at him, brows pulling down sharply, and Karkat wondered with belated unease if he was offended, if Karkat should maybe rein in his fucking blatherhole for two seconds. Then the subjugglator’s dark look broke and he laughed so hard he bent in half, and even more unnervingly, it seemed to be at least partly genuine amusement. Clinging to Karkat, he hauled himself back upright.

“Ahh, little wiggle bro, you're good for a brother’s soul.”

“The fuck I am.” Karkat was pretty sure he was blushing in embarrassment at the almost-endearment and scowled furiously to cover. 

They began moving again, and Makara actually did tone it down from “wrecked off his face” to “weak at the knees and slightly dizzy”. 

The arena announcer was discussing the previous three matches over the speakers, recapping the previous match in embarrassing detail that Karkat was trying really hard not to pay attention to, speculating about the sudden overturn and about the next round, due to start after a short break. When Karkat glanced up at the royal box he saw that it had emptied, only the four thrones remaining to signify the royal authority.

“Messiahs’ mercy, but that motherfucking voice of yours,” Makara murmured.

“What about my voice?” Karkat said distractedly.

“Like motherfucking diamonds turned to sound,” Makara said, “sweet and soft and singing a body quiet whether he would or no. Was all a brother could do to resist it, and if you can quell _my_ rage, wiggler, ain't no living troll can stand against, most like.”

Karkat’s mouth opened, but it took a while for anything coherent to come out, and then it was, “Seriously? You're the ultimate test, huh?” Then he wanted to knock himself out, maybe prevent himself from saying anything so pan-meltingly free of all survival instinct.

Instead of slaughtering him on the spot, Makara just chuckled and leaned down again, rumbled quietly in Karkat’s ear, “My Ancestor reigned as Grand Highblood for a thousand sweeps and more, little shoosh-artist. Were my pan free of the blockers they put on me, you and all who watch here would fall weeping to your knees with my fear-mongering, begging mercy from your own shadows. That I got from him, and my righteous fury, too. If my thirst for slaughter, my vengeful rage itself cannot hold against you, I doubt me any could.”

Karkat swallowed. So… he _was_ the ultimate test, actually. And Karkat had soothed him down, had had that fury and power in his hands and quelled it. That was… a thing. Yep.

They were almost at the gate now, and much as Karkat kind of wanted to explore that further, there was no time. He huffed and said, quick and low, “Any idea why they want to see us?”

“They’ve asked thrice in my knowing of things,” the reply came, just as quiet. “Seems to be whenever the whim so takes them, when they think as they have something they can gain or a condescension to up and offer. No chance have I to find what they speak on, but the trolls pass through unharmed so far as I have seen.”

“Okay,” Karkat muttered rapidly, “but why now, why us? What do they _want?_ ”

“Who knows why the heathens do anything? Pure curiosity, like enough. No thought they can find for how you could have won this match, so they seek to learn. Say as little truth as you can, for as I spoke before, the less they know of us the better.”

So it was probably interrogation after all. Some kind of torture that didn't leave marks maybe. Fuck. Better than death, but fuck. Karkat’s digestive sac was tying itself into a knot and he had to swallow twice before he could respond.

“Okay, yeah, the less they can use against us, I get that,” he muttered, “there's just one problem. I don't think I can hold out long, and _I suck at lying anyway!_ ” he finished in a whisper as they stepped through the gate.

Makara sighed. “Messiahs sing down mercy,” he muttered, and then they were surrounded.

Karkat froze, staring. The arena guards who'd dealt with him previously had worn fairly light armor and held their weapons casually. These people were so heavily armored they looked like imperial drones, and their stun-spears were ready and aimed, whining faintly with the power charge.

“Step apart, please,” said a woman's voice levelly from behind the mirrored faceplate of one helmet.

To Karkat’s disbelief, Makara straightened up and Karkat had to cling to his arm to stop him from moving away. “What are you going to do?” Karkat demanded of the guards, breath harsh in his throat. “You can't cull him, he's an incredible fighter, isn't that what your people like to see? It's not his fault he lost, he'd win against anyone else--”

“No, we're not--quiet!” the guard snapped. “We're not going to kill him. If he attacks us--”

“He won't attack, I pacified him!” Karkat interrupted, holding on tight. “What are you going to do to him?”

“If he controls himself, nothing.” Her helmet moved as she shook her head, muttering, “Why the hell don't the trainers explain this stuff? Look,” she said more loudly, “there's no penalty for losing a match. You've been called before royalty and he’s dangerous. You need to separate so we can secure him.”

Oh. That did make sense, if she was telling the truth. In any case, faced by this wall of weapons there wasn't much choice. 

Despite the undeniable idiocy of any attempt to resist, Karkat was still startled when Makara stepped willingly away from him, swaying only slightly. His surprise was nothing compared to the guards’, who shifted and muttered to each other. 

Even the apparent leader seemed taken aback, and it took a minute before a small group of guards gathered their nerve and approached, a set of restraints blinking with lights and circuitry in hand. Makara’s chest rumbled in a rising snarl as they drew around him, but he held himself still, tucked his hands meekly behind him. His eyes sought over their heads to fix on Karkat.

Swallowing, Karkat nodded to him, _yes, good job_ , _keep doing that._

Makara’s eyes never left him, held him like a lifeline, and Karkat found himself utterly unable to look away. He fought his own instincts to step in, step between, stuck trying to offer some kind of reassurance and steadiness with just his eyes ( _you can do this, you can bear this, I have you_ ) until the guards completed their work and stepped back, leaving the subjugglator restrained at hand and foot, but no longer with hostile strangers gathered close around him. 

There was a pause while everyone on both sides took a quiet, relieved breath.

“Do either of you need medical attention?” the leader asked. 

Makara was abruptly right in front of Karkat, snarling aloud. From what he could see past either side of that long, scarred back, this time he was the only one surprised. One or two of the weapons whined slightly louder, but the guards held themselves in check. 

“--Which does _not mean culling_ ,” the leader added overtop of the snarl. “As you should _know_ by now, if you'd ever been sane enough to let someone treat you,” she added to Makara. “It means getting any injuries dealt with so they don't get worse and you're back in fighting condition as soon as possible. Didn't the trainers mention this when you arrived?”

Though his snarl quieted down, Makara didn't seem inclined to answer, so Karkat put a cautious hand on one bound arm and stepped out beside him. “They mentioned it,” he said shortly. “They're pretty much a herd of unmitigated bulgestains, though, so I didn't actually believe it.”

“Hm. Well, it's true; physicians don't cull you,” she said. “So, any injuries?”

Karkat hesitated and Makara’s snarl bubbled up again. Looming half-naked, bound and weaponless beside Karkat, he still effortlessly gave off the sense of barely restrained destruction.

“Motherfucking swear,” Makara growled, “that no hurt or harm will come to my littlest of palemates, or I will hunt every mirthless heathen one of you down to rip asunder.”

The guard sounded more annoyed than intimidated when she answered, but Karkat’s mind was too awhirl to listen by then, so who the fuck knew or cared what she said. _Littlest of palemates_ \--Makara was acting like this was _real_ , not just a temporary, desperate patch job to save them both, not some convenient fling, but something with potential, something… precious.

He’d already been pretending, though, playing it up, maybe this was just acting too? Although--there was no need, when the aliens didn't know anything about moirallegiance, to play up details they wouldn't know. No need to act like this was some great romance… unless he actually believed it.

Or believed, at least, that he needed Karkat to soothe him, true romance or no. How desperate might he be, after being lost to his anger for so long, to keep close at frond the key to his sanity?

Which meant as soon as things changed and he didn't need soothing anymore, this protective concern, whatever apparent relationship might appear between them, would vanish. Karkat took a hard breath.

Although it was probably ridiculous to even think about that when they were held captive here and unlikely to be freed in the foreseeable future. Being thrown into an arena on the regular for his conquerors’ amusement was clearly not great for Makara’s mental balance. He wasn’t gonna stop needing soothing. He’d probably accept soothing from a _rock_ if it tried hard enough.

(Which _sucked_ , they’d never have a chance to form a solid, equal relationship this way, it would always be based on necessity and Karkat would never know if they were even suited to each other in real life, if Makara even _liked_ him beyond his voice--) 

( _\--Like diamonds turned to sound, ain’t no living thing that could stand against you..._ )

Right. Don’t get sentimental. Karkat was probably going to live out his mutant lowblood life as Makara’s patch job palemate in some kind of alien murder theater and be grateful for it.

Oh god, had Makara even _noticed_ he was a mutant yet--

Makara bumped gently against Karkat’s uninjured shoulder, startling him out of the unhappy tangle of his thoughts. “Caught him with a club,” came the rumbled response to whatever the guard had said. “He missed the brunt of it, but it's fair clear something went awry, as he's been at favoring the arm since.”

The guard nodded. “The physician will tend to you in a moment,” she said to Karkat, then turned to Makara. “And will you allow your condition to be tended to afterwards? Your…” she made an uncertain gesture, encompassing Makara’s state before flicking sideways to Karkat. “...Whatever he did?”

Makara’s voice turned abruptly icy. “Nothing as my little diamond did need be any concern of yours.”

“Settle down,” Karkat muttered, bumping Makara slightly less gently. “I didn't fucking hurt him,” he told the guard, glaring to cover how hot his face felt, how his pusher was fluttering like some delicate piece of palebait in a florid romance novel.

“...Very well,” the guard said after a tense moment, tone skeptical. She gestured with her stun spear at Karkat and a few of the guards near him. “See him to the physician. We’ll meet you afterwards in the west hall.”

Karkat’s adrenaline sponge squeezed in panic as guards moved between him and Makara, as he found himself being urged ahead down the hall. He throttled down the immediate desire to protest--he’d be fine, he could handle their stupid mediculler. The guards were being nice for now and he didn’t want to change that. If he made a fuss about being separated, Makara might get agitated, and then he'd get hurt if Karkat couldn't calm him down fast enough.

This was _fine_. Karkat flexed and relaxed his fingers, letting himself be led. Fine.

“Wait--” Makara said, and then, “please.” 

It struck Karkat like a knife to the pusher.

The guards hesitated; the guard leader looked at Makara where he was stiff and taut, head and horns tilted slightly back to expose his throat. Submissive, humbling himself. His voice, when he spoke, was calm except for the quiet, tense clicking in his thorax.

“Let me stay by him, know my little diamond’s well seen to. I'll mind willingly, make no strife or struggle.”

Karkat stared up at him. The leader hesitated. The guards around her stirred, and one of them muttered something that sounded like a disbelieving curse.

“You'll go easily, without fighting us?” the leader said neutrally.

“I will.”

She tilted her head, mask gleaming. “If you attack the physician, you'll be knocked out and possibly killed on the spot. You may have potential to be an exciting contender, but the physician is a citizen.”

“I hear you, motherfucker,” the subjugglator said mildly. “So as they cause no harm, I won't aggress.”

“And the victor?” She gestured to Karkat, still looking at Makara. “You really don’t intend any attempt at revenge on him?”

Karkat snorted.

Makara stared down at her, brows pulling in. “And for what mirthless unholy reason would I up and wreak vengeance at my own littlest diamond?”

“You’ve killed every single troll you’ve gone up against. Unnecessarily, I might add. You literally pulled the last contender’s limbs off.”

“Of fucking _course_ he did!” Karkat snapped. “You throw him in an arena to fight for his life and then expect him to just be able to switch that shit on and off? By himself? With strangers? In a rage? Of fucking _course_ they're going to try to tear each other apart! What the bulge-blistering hell did you think was gonna happen? They’d hold fronds and braid each other’s keratin strands?”

“Shoosh, little diamond,” Makara murmured, and Karkat threw him a startled look, a shiver going through him and taking some of his frustration with it. And mortifying the fuck out of him, but whatever. 

He swallowed down further angry words (seriously, though, how the fuck dare they), remembering that it was probably not a good idea to _yell at the people with weapons_. Or the people your m--your vaguely-pale person was currently begging a favor off of.

The leader shook her head with an annoyed sound. “Aliens,” she muttered. “Come along, then. And mind your manners.”

She waved a gauntleted hand and the guards arranged themselves around the trolls again and escorted them on down the corridors. When they got to a small, clean room, one guard followed Karkat and Makara in and stood by the wall, faintly-humming spear aimed at the subjugglator. Smart, not to be too trusting.

The physician who arrived a minute later was nothing like any doctorturer Karkat had ever heard of. There was a certain amount of prodding involved in the examination, but the intent apparently wasn't either to cause pain or to test how well Karkat could ignore it. Instead, he was meant to say exactly where and when it hurt.

It was counterintuitive, to say the least, and he only gave in when the physician growled almost like a troll and shook a little needle thing in his face. Makara rumbled dangerously and both guard and physician twitched. Without even thinking, Karkat found his voice sliding into that pale register, soft, insistent burr of harmonics slipping out on a shoosh. The rumble stopped.

After that it seemed best to cooperate and get this over as quickly as possible. Karkat got the needle shoved in his shoulder, which made him hiss, an ointment spread across the whole area with a thin bandage over it, and orders to limit the use of that arm for a week or so. And then he was free, uninjured and unculled, with his shoulder somehow reduced to a mild ache and his face hot.

He stepped back into the corridor scowling fiercely and avoiding eye contact.

“Thanks,” he mumbled as Makara stepped up beside him. “For the, uh, the company.” Needed or not, it had been nice to have someone watching his back in there. Despite the squirming embarrassment, which was all his own fault anyway.

“No motherfucking problem, my palest brother.” Makara smiled down at him, looking almost shy. “Karkat,” he murmured, like he was tasting it. “Never motherfucking dreamt as serendipity might get to having its reality on before, but Messiahs both smite me if I doubt it now.”

“You--oh,” Karkat squeaked.

The moment was broken by the guards urging them on. There was no more time to speak as they were hustled along through the corridors, but Karkat found himself sliding glances up and sideways at the troll beside him, the looming figure, hands bound behind him, head bowed to let his tall horns manage the doorways, legs shackled but with a stride massive enough that even hobbled he kept up easily.

Basically: terrifying. 

And casting Karkat little shy uncertain glances in return like a wiggler with a crush. Like this terrifying troll--like… Gamzee?-- might be… _his_.

Eventually they were ushered into a small, nicely furnished room, some kind of antechamber with richly cushioned benches on either wall and a tall, arched set of double doors at the end. 

“Wait here,” the guard leader directed as the rest of the squad shuffled out. “You’ll be called when Their Majesties are ready for you. There are guards posted in the halls and at either door. I expect no trouble from you.”

The door to the hall closed behind her, and they were alone.

The silence stretched for a long moment, and then Karkat burst out, “Seriously, you think it's serendipity?”

Gamzee-- Makara-- _Gamzee_ blinked and then straightened a little. Karkat hadn’t noticed how the other troll had swayed automatically towards him until he pulled back. “You got the thought on you as it's not?” he said, openly dismayed.

“No--I just--I mean--” Karkat’s face went hot. “You don’t even know me!”

“No,” Gamzee said, and his voice had gone all soft and careful and kind of sad in a way that made Karkat want to--do _something_ , do whatever to make that sound go away. “Nor you me. But you’ve still been as to show me the sort of kindness and care as I haven’t had touch of in a long motherfucking stretch of time. You’ve risked for me beyond what you had need to.”

He paused, and Karkat wanted to argue, but couldn't quite manage words.

“I know you to be brave,” Gamzee went on. “I know you to be strong. I know you to be soft and caring and--good, as I would not want to see wiped out. As I would protect if I could.” He paused again and his voice dropped still lower. “Seems full serendipitous to my eye, but… if you differ on it, little brother, I'll take no recourse but give up my claim.”

“No!” Karkat said, hot-faced and reeling with the onslaught of, what the fuck, completely out of nowhere mind-boggling undeserved praise. “No, I'm not--differing! I, um. Just didn't realize you'd… feel that way.” Holy fuck that sounded so _stupid_ , good job Karkat, stuff your walk-nub a little farther down your gullet. “I. Also think you’re. Nice.” Wow, okay, he was going to have to figure out how to fatally combust from mortification right the fuck now. “I mean I--” he was blushing so hard it felt like he might actually have found the key to spontaneous self-combustion. “You’re really, um.”

“Hey,” Gamzee said softly, smiling at him. “Shoosh, little diamond mine.”

Karkat's breathing hitched, and he stared up at that smile, caught. Gamzee watched him for a beat and then his head tilted, his smile went just a bit sly, and he said again, almost testing, “Shoosh.”

Karkat swayed before he even registered the difference in Gamzee’s voice, the faint rumble of subvocal harmonics that went straight through him, pulling warmth and drifting ease in their wake. It was--a little like listening to a pale porn vid, the same tug and pull on his instincts, that same sense that he could choose to surrender or shake it off. He… kind of didn’t want to shake it off.

Gamzee’s gaze on him was extremely smug. “No motherfucking pale virtuoso like you, maybe,” Gamzee told him, “but I do have a lick or two of skill to my own name.”

Karkat blinked dazedly, wordless and flushing.

Gamzee’s grin deepened. “Look at that pretty motherfucking color all getting its show on,” he said, voice a low purr of noise. The purple eyes on Karkat's face narrowed, sharp above the lazy grin. His head tilted the other way. “Rust, a brother was thinking, but now I get my look on close it's brighter than that. You all to being off-spectrum, little brother?”

Karkat’s pusher clenched, a cold rush of adrenaline suddenly sweeping up past the haze. He stared, breath caught in his throat, mouth opening and then closing, tongue refusing to wake up and _form words damn it_ \--because what could he even say? He was _dead_ now, Gamzee would kill him for the presumption of setting mutant frond to his highblood face--

Gamzee broke the spinning, horrible silence with a loud bark of laughter. He ducked in so fast Karkat couldn’t do more than squeak and tip his tiny useless horns forward defensively. “It’s pretty,” Gamzee purred, nuzzling that sharp-toothed grin right up against Karkat’s temple. “I like it.”

 _Oh_. Karkat sucked in air again, voice shaking as the chill eased back out of him. “You fucking _asshole_.”

Gamzee started laughing against his cheek, bracing his nugbone against Karkat’s, breathless and shaking with his hands still bound behind him, and Karkat hit him on his big stupid bare shoulder and continued to blush furiously. “You slime-sucking bulgeweed you did that on _purpose_ oh my fucking god.”

Gamzee nuzzled him again. “Can hardly blame a brother when you're such a pile of mirth and glee to tease! Gotta get my enjoyment on in full, little palebro.” He sighed a sweet, pleased sound and leaned in still closer, shifting more of his weight over to Karkat, settling in. “You're a bunch of bright miracles all stacked up, how's a brother not to take note?”

“How about you go jump in a puddle and drown, you utter piece of hoofbeast shit,” Karkat grumbled, and pretended he wasn’t just about melting at the way Gamzee just continued snickering happily, nuzzling into his hair and horn. The way his whole demeanor seemed younger, the way he’d gone so-- relaxed and open and trusting against Karkat, even shackled and helpless in their enemies’ hands.

Karkat maybe nuzzled a little back. 

Maybe.

They didn’t have an audience anymore, so, fuck it, who was there to judge?

By the time the big double doors creaked and swung open, Karkat was so relaxed that he didn't even jump. He felt… safe. Cared for, secure. For the first time in a long time, he had hope, even though it was objectively stupid, even though he had no idea what was going to happen. He had a moirail, someone to fight for, someone to fight for him.

An attendant stepped through the doors and announced, “The victor and his defeated companion are called for their audience with royalty!”

Karkat swallowed hard and looked up at Gamzee, who met his eyes and nodded. Together they rose and went in.


End file.
